Motion Picture News (Jan - Mar 1914)

50 THE MOTION PICTURE NEWS An Operator Will Never have any trouble with lamp house adjustments when he is using LAMP LUBRICANT \L &-j Just a touch of one of the handy-sized sticks to any movable part that does not immediately respond to the slightest touch, and it becomes a positive delight to make the adjustments. The rack bars, sliding rods, tilting screws and feed handles, lubricated with Ezo, work smoothly and evenly. The carbons feed down evenly. That means a steady, unflickering light. Ask your exchange for it, or we will mail a stick to you if you will wrap a quarter in silver in one of your letter heads and address it to the EZO MANUFACTURING CO. 220 West Forty-Second Street New York City "We guarantee every stick" THE PHANTOSCOPE A motion picture projecting machine using standard film, tak ing current from incandescent lamp socket, alternaiing or direct current. Can be stopped indefinitely and will not ignite the film. Also projects lantern slides. Remarkably simple and weighs but eighteen pounds. Designed especially for home, school and salesmen. Price, $75.00 complete The Phantoscope Mfg. Co. Washington, D. C, U. S. A. Why Exhibitors Fail (Continued from page 16) supply the equipment, and then let things run themselves. * * * * CtTT7"IIY didn't you get busy and find out what was » » wrong with the projection machine? No machine, if it is handled properly, will give bad light or cause jumps and flickers. You've got a motor drive. They're a nice thing. You say it eliminates the expense of one boy, costing, perhaps, six dollars a week. The machine runs itself, and your operator is off at the other side of the booth, not knowing how things look on the screen. Why don't you make him stick tight to the machine, where he belongs, in case something does go wrong? You have shown the grossest carelessness and disregard for your business, and yet you complain that business is bad. It's your own fault. You say no one kicked because the light was poor or breaks occurred. Do you think that an outsider is going to give a whoop about your business if you don't care. No wise exhibitor will wait for complaints from his patrons before he remedies a trouble. He'll dig in, sleeves up, and fix it himself, or get someone that can, before anyone has a chance* to complain. You can't expect your operator to break his neck for you, if you don't work with him occasionally, and let him know that his efforts are a vital factor in your success. "You've got to work right with your men, Jim, and give them thunder in a decent, constructive way, when they don't do as they should. If you don't care, it's a cinch that they won't. What kind of business sense has a man who lets his posters be poorly hung? Don't that bespeak the same sloppy, slovenly management inside the house. You cut down the lights outside because business fell off. Did you think it would bring more business to dispense with them? The chairs haven't been dusted for a week. Let some woman with a white shirtwaist come in, dirty a sleeve on that arm, and she'll tell all her friends "Do you think they'll flock in on the strength of a story like that? You've got a little girl down there in front pounding out ragtime, irrespective of what is on the screen. Spend a few dollars more a week, get another violinist — another item of expense you've eliminated without recognizing its value as a profit-maker — make them look over the reels before they're put on at a regular show, and have them pick out the music that is best fitted to the pictures. "Don't sit around, looking blue and glum, cursing everything and everybody. You've got to merit business before you get it. The golden dollars are streaming past your theatre every hour of the day and night, and you haven't got brains enough in action to see the chances you are losing. A normal baby could outdistance you in this business. You're just like others who flock into it, seing only the great big bank accounts, the luxury and ease it would bring, the quick profits, without taking enough time to study out whether you would have to do anything beyond make the investment to get it. Why, man. you've got the chance of your life right under your nose $ $ * * 6 4'W'i ITJ sling an occosional poster into some vacant winIt dow. That won't get you any business. You, or rather, your usher, or whoever happens to be there, distributes heralds from the theatre. That la-t i good advertising, but it can't stand alone. Your newspaper ads are money wasted. You run the name of the pictures, finish In saying 'At the Orpheum To-night.' Why don't it busy, put en some overalls, go down and clean out that house, repainl the front, put in some new lights, get some photographs For thai lobby, give that usher and the manager some straight-from-the-shoulder talk, or else get employees with some -cum1 of decency, business and abilitj to help you? Then tell the public, through the news In writing to advertisers please mention "THE MOTION PICTURE NEWS"